Waterproof buying guide updated for 2019

Fed up with winter and packing for a trip somewhere warm? We've updated our waterproof camera buying guide so you can be sure your scuba selfies look their best.

The Ricoh WG-50 and Fujifilm FinePix XP130 have been removed to make way for their successors – the WG-60 and XP140 – and Ricoh's step-up WG-6 model has also been added. Our top recommendations, however, have not changed; we still think that the Olympus TG-5 is the best of the bunch.

Good option. Especially if you are doing a lot of snorkeling or scuba diving.

But there can still be a case for these compact waterproof cameras.

On vacation, one of the things I like about these small cameras is that I can just stick them in my pocket. If there is no photo opportunity, then I just sit back and relax. But if there is a photo op., then I have a camera with me. :)

A waterproof case on an ILC is basically *only* sensible if you do a lot of scuba or snorkeling. Which covers about 0.001% of the population. The rest of us just want a camera we can take anywhere without having to worry about it getting wet or dropping it.

For anyone interested in a waterproof compact . . . do yourself a favour and get one! :)

These waterproof compact cameras have been my favourite "other" camera for vacations, treks out to the beach or skiing (which I will be doing this weekend.) ever since I got my first tough camera.

I may take my dSLR or mirrorless with me on vacation, but I will always take a waterproof tough camera as well.

When I am putting away my "big" camera so it won't get damaged I will put my tough camera in my pocket. And that is usually when we are about to have some fun.

So, because it is the camera I have with me more often, I have gotten so many keepers with these tough cameras.

NOTE: I am posting this in a completely selfish manner. I really like these cameras and I want this category to be around a long time. I hope that anyone that can use a camera like this will buy one! So the manufacturers will want to keep making these cameras so I can keep buying them!!! :)

I wonder how big a rugged, waterproof version of the GR III would be. Still pretty small, I imagine. The GR III is actually slightly *smaller* than the TG-5. It's tiny. A rugged, waterproof one would be pretty amazing. Especially if it also had a built-in flash.

Which reminds me that... this is actually close to the Sealife which is also recommended 🤭

But if you just want the camera without the special housing (the camera on its own is already waterproof to an 18m depth), you’ve got to order it as a part directly from Sealife (not particularly practical outside of the US as far as I can tell)

I would love to see more activity in this segment. The TG-5 is by far the best tough cam for most people, but it could be even better. If I could ask for one feature in a hypothetical TG-6, it would be a wider focal length at the wide end of the lens. Also, smartphones have shown that there's a lot that can be done with computational techniques to enhance the image quality of these small sensors. I use a TG-5 every day and would definitely buy a TG-6 if it was a significant improvement.

Oh, and please fix the oversharpening on the in-camera focus stacking feature, it's an awesome feature but the JPEGs it produces are oversharpened and crunchy to the point that I just never find the results satisfactory. A little tweaking of that algorithm would go a long way!

I suppose there is a market for really extreme completely unbreakable gear, which Oly may be going for with the TG-5, but the reduction in usability and versatility takes it off the radar a bit for me, especially since it's still just a 1/2.3" sensor.

I took 300+ pictures with my TG-5 today in various lighting conditions from full sun to basically black, at all kinds of odd angles, while climbing roofs and crawling through attics, and never once felt like I needed a flip-out screen.

We don't usually carry our smartphones with us in those circumstances, and it means we can get rare sentimental self-portraits, even if the quality isn't great. The 21mm wide angle and flip-around screen, are of course, the features that allow this. With HDR mode and some judicious post-production, the images are okay...

Well maybe it's just that I've taken a bazillion pictures with my TG-5, but I don't find it hard to take a selfie with it. I just took a quick three test shots and got my face bang in the middle every time. You just hold it level at arm's length and point the lens at yourself. When you're used to the camera, you know what will be in the frame just based on where you're pointing it.

I pretty much only look at the screen to confirm focus lock (I keep the beeps turned off) and to make sure that my tape measure is legible. Other than that I'm just pointing and shooting. I know what 24mm should look like at this point, and if I pull the camera out of my toolbelt and the zoom has been bumped even to 1.1x, I notice immediately.

That's not to say that a flip out screen isn't potentially useful, but with enough experience it's really not necessary.

Sure, that's fair. But the reason we take selfies is usually not because we want our faces bang in the middle. We don't really need more pictures of just our faces at this point, and hiking is not usually when we're looking our best, anyway. We ideally try to frame the images around the landscape.

Which is why I like the extra 3mm on the wide end and the flip-around screen, because both make different compositions that capture the environment a lot easier to achieve.

The exact same TG-5 as I have now except with an extra 3mm on the wide end is something I would pay about $100 extra for. For what it's worth I do get that "faces bang in the middle" isn't necessarily a great composition. I was just doing a very quick test. My point was just that at 24mm or wider, you almost don't beed to see the screen to be able to compose a shot. A flip-out screen would baturally make it easier though, and there *have* been times when it would have been useful even to me. And while I *can* take a selfie without the screen, I could certainly take *better* selfies if the screen flipped around, no question. It's just not a priority for me personally.

If the TG-6 comes with a 21mm or wider lens though, I'll buy it the day it comes out. That would make a huge difference in my work.

The camera manufacturers would probably point to low sales as the explanation for the lack of development in this market segment. On the other hand, the low sales is perhaps a result of the manufacturers failing to offer what people really want.

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